Share this:

Like this:

Ralph Maughan

Dr. Ralph Maughan is professor emeritus of political science at Idaho State University with specialties in natural resource politics, public opinion, interest groups, political parties, voting and elections. Aside from academic publications, he is author or co-author of three hiking/backpacking guides, and he is President of the Western Watersheds Project.

4 Responses to California wolverine came from the Rocky Mountains

Let’s hope Mr. Wolverine took a mate or two along. Perhaps they can start a population in a state friendlier to them than Montana where, incredibly, they are still trapped in spite of their low numbers and a lack of data on their genetics and population. But hey, trappers gotta have their trophy animal, right? MT Fish, Wildlife & Parks apparently agrees.

Shameful indeed–and there is no quota on pine martens! (I saw my first one ever last autumn. It’s not like you run into them around every trail bend.) Fishers are apparently much more rare–a quota of seven for all of MT (they are trapped in just two districts). With a quota that low, why trap them at all? And how many really die in traps? (Same goes for wolverine–I’m guessing more than the quota, since indiscriminate traps don’t keep track of quotas.) And the state of MT has listed the wolverine as a “species of concern,” no less. There’s something seriously wrong here.

Calendar

Quote

‎"At some point we must draw a line across the ground of our home and our being, drive a spear into the land and say to the bulldozers, earthmovers, government and corporations, “thus far and no further.” If we do not, we shall later feel, instead of pride, the regret of Thoreau, that good but overly-bookish man, who wrote, near the end of his life, “If I repent of anything it is likely to be my good behaviour."